BATTLE PIG!

I can't remember exactly why the phrase 'Battle Pig' entered my mind, but I know I was mucking about with my mate Dazzler, who I tease relentlessly about his workout schedule.

See, even right then, there was no need for me to mention the fact that Dazzler loves his gym like a drowning alcoholic loves an oxygen cocktail.

But he *is* Dazzler and he *does* like to pump iron, so it must be mentioned.

Dazzler and I were spitballing on some other topic when the phrase 'Battle Pig' arose.

I just loved the mental picture of a really cute, bubblegum pink porker, wearing an army helmet and carrying a gun. It soon progressed from 'Battle Pig' to 'BATTLE PIG' to 'BATTLE PIG!'.

Problem is, I can't draw, so it took a while before I could corner some artists, thrust paper and pencil into their hands, and demand they bring BATTLE PIG! to cartoony life.

But now, here he is, in all his majesty:

Thanks to my friends Paul (drawing) and Dan (colouring) for donating their skills.

Now I think BATTLE PIG! needs to have his own comic. Or a meme. Or at the very least, some high quality puns. Feel free to add your own suggestions, create your own situational artwork for BATTLE PIG!, make tribute films, etc etc. Let's make BATTLE PIG! the new bee's knees.

I hope you all had a great Christmas, and I wish you a happy, BATTLE PIG!-y 2013

Internet, I Need You To Help Me Kidnap a Dog

The other night I pulled my car into the little laneway that our driveway faces onto, when I noticed something small and white hovering in front of the roller door.

As my headlights caught glinting eyes, I realised it was a little animal.

Shifting into neutral and pulling up the handbrake, I opened the door and walked around in front of the Yaris.

And there it was - a sweet little Maltese terrier, looking up at me with brown eyes.

I crouched down and opened my arms, and the little fellow ran up to me straightaway.

It didn't quite leap into my arms, but I knew straightaway there was a bond there.

And it's not just because I have something of a soft spot in my heart for small white dogs.

Sure, Tintin inspired me to become a journalist, and I've always liked the idea of getting a small white Snowy-type dog to be my shadow, my canine companion in travel, adventure, mystery-solving and crime-fighting. I know it's not practical. You can't just take a terrier on as hand luggage in these budget airline times of ours. And while I think a pooch would be an awesome addition to any office, I'm not sure whether my colleagues would be onboard.

But it's a fancy I've never quite lost.

So as I scratched this little Maltese terrier's neck, and realised it wasn't wearing a collar, a sudden future of possibility opened up.

I would take this little dog home, clean him/her up, shop its nervous half-shaking, and train it.

I would call him/her Snowy. We would do journalism, and fight...

"Are you right there?"

It was an older man in a townhouse on the other side of the laneway, a few metres from where I sat with the dog.

"Oh! Are you missing a white dog?"

The elderly man pointed. "The house on the corner," he said. Then he lifted up a small white pug-faced creature.

"I do have a white dog, but he has a black eye," he grinned, gesturing to the markings on the dog's grumpy face.

"Oh," I replied. "I just noticed it didn't have a collar..."

"Yes, it's from the house on the corner."

All right then, Mr Community Service. 

I gathered up the sweet little terrier into my arms, and walked towards the townhouse on the corner. Its curtains were open, and through the screen doors I could seen a woman walk through the living room and towards the front door. 

"Oh, thank you!" she said, unlocking the front door and walking up the short path to the gate. Two young girls followed behind, her daughters, she went on to say.

"She just got out; I heard you talking to the neighbour," she said, reaching to grab the white fluffball from my hands.

'No problem," I said. "I was just worried he'd get hit..."

"She," she said. "Her name's Snow."

I blinked.

Snow.

"She's had fleas unfortunately," the woman continued.

I couldn't believe it, Snow... hang on, what?

"Yeah, we took her for a swim in the sea but that doesn't seem to have worked. We'll take her in and give her the full treatment," she said, passing the dog back to one of her girls.

"Well, uh, if you ever need, you know, a dog-sitter...."

The woman smiled. "Thanks again," she said, as they retreated into the house.

I turned and walked back to my still-running car, my dreams of doggy derrings-do turning into mere doggy-doo.

Now, it may be the case that you think an all-white Maltese terrier being named "Snow" is not that surprising, but I say screw you, this is fate.

That is my dog, people. My Snowy, just across the road.

A lovely little dog with fleas. Fleas! I could take better care of that dog, even though my house is a bit messy. We could have adventures onstage and off.

But how to make it happen? How to deprive a probably-nice-but-let's-assume-they're-horrid family of their probably-treasured-but-let's-say-neglected pooch?

Internet - I need your help to kidnap a dog.

Remember November: Cane Toads

It was less than a second after I spotted the cane toad that I realised I was about to watch it die.

It was just last night. I had pulled up at the Albion five-ways, waiting for a light to go green, allowing me to make a right hook turn.

Then I noticed something small flop on the bitumen about 10 metres in front of my car.

The toad was halfway across the opposite side of the road, jumping limply towards the median strip. Goodness knows how it had even got that far alive. Cane toads are not the fastest of movers, and this one seemed particularly sluggish.

A red car zoomed towards the toad, but missed it by a few centimetres.

The toad flopped itself forward again, enough to be directly underneath the body of a silver car that just then whizzed over it.

By now I was watching with a tightness in my throat, the sense of inevitability almost oppressive, despite only three or four seconds having passed.

The toad made a final leap towards the strip. It was about a metre away, but it may as well have been a  different planet. The toad was doomed.

A white van tore down the slight decline at the other end of the fiveways, and within a second was upon the toad.

Its front wheel perfectly aligned with the cane toad, and with a crunch, and a sharp flip onto its back, the toad was dead. The van carried on.

I let out a breath I didn't realise I'd been holding. Then, with a gape in the traffic and my light green, I made my right turn.

The toad was belly up, pale in the light of the street lamps. I steered my Yaris around the corpse and left it in the rear view.

Not the actual cane toad. This cane toad is an actor,
taking part in a re-enactment.

I'm not sure why I felt for the cane toad. They're horrible things, an introduced pest that's caused untold damage to the state's biodiversity. I've run over my fair share during the height of summer, when they swarm across roads in suburban areas. The popping sound as tyres roll over them would be familiar to most Queenslanders.

Indeed, most Queenslanders would gleefully admit to having the blood of dozens of cane toads on their hands - or more likely, on an old cricket bat or golf club.

We weren't big golfers in my family, but still we had an old bronze-coloured nine-iron, kept specifically for use smashing toads from the edges of our property back into the scrub bush from whence they had come.

I seem to have a fuzzy memory of someone in the neighbourhood putting a bunch of toads in an empty petrol can, then setting them on fire. Crackle, crackle.

Nowadays, such relish in destruction is frowned upon - the sanctioned disposal method is placing collected cane toads in a plastic bag, then placing said bag in the freezer. It's the most humane way - although forgive me if I've never been very keen on having toad eyes stare at me when I reach into the freezer to retrieve some chicken nuggets.

But for a moment, I felt for that cane toad, or at least, I felt the responsibility of bearing witness to the extinction of a life.

I got over it within seconds. It was, after all, a cane toad.

What creative methods of death have you seen visited upon the cane toad?

Four Legs Good

It's nice when a fairly selfish desire turns out to produce quite a happy day for many people.

Video by animal and heavy metal lover Andrew Saltmarsh.
You can read his take on the day here.

I received so many thank-yous from people today, that you'd think I'd have done something impressive. But all I did was book a baby animal farm... so I could play with baby animals for a few hours. As we set up the enclosure this morning, and I sat on the grass with goats clamouring over me, I called out to The Wah, entreating him to come in and play.

"Someone has to take charge out here. You've already lost all cognitive function."

And he was right. They had me at "Here are the piglets."

You complete me.

I think it was the enthusiasm with which others embraced the idea of the Baby Animal Farm that made it something truly impressive. By the time the petting zoo officially opened at 10:30 Saturday morning, there was already a decent gathering of 15 or so. That swelled over the following hour; at its peak, I reckon around 100 people were milling around Hardgrave Park, enjoying the picture perfect autumn sunshine, the sausages and cupcakes, and of course, the calm and happy animals.

It was lovely to welcome the RSPCA Qld community outreach volunteers on site as well, selling fundraising merch and raising awareness about their excellent Adopt-a-Pet program.  This was enhanced in no small way by the addition of two beautiful Irish Wolfhound puppies, both up for adoption.

I'd say I knew or recognised perhaps half of all the people who attended; a testament, I think, to the power of a charming idea and social media. It wasn't so much a case of the Horse Whisperer, as the Hey-There's-Two-Shetland-Ponies Shouterer.

But whether I knew them or not, it was the surprising sweetness of a communal affair that proved the most satisfying. A whole lot of people just chilling out and having a nice time doing something a little different. Something that just happened to turn the cuteness right up to 11.

Which one of these creatures is not acting the goat?

The money aspect was icing on the cake. You might remember from my original post that I spent the $700 required to hire the petting zoo, hoping to recoup costs through a "Choose Your Own" donation strategy. With general donation entries, plus $2 a pop Shetland pony rides and $1 cups of feed - I wound up making $400 profit. All of that will go to charity; I'm planning $200 each to RSPCA Qld and Best Friends Rescue.

I'm starting to get reports about just how generous some people were, and it's enough to make one come over all heart-bursty. I am very, very grateful to you all.

Props.

I mentioned above how the real success of the day was its true community feel, and that was due to recruiting eager local small businesses, non-profits, charities and volunteers.

I can highly recommend Brisbane Pony Parties if anyone else in South-East Queensland is looking to hold their own animal farm. Sandra was professional, helpful, fun and incredibly generous with her animals. You could tell the critters are well looked after, and their behaviour was delightful. I dubbed one of the piglets "Hyper Piggie" due to his exuberance in the paddock, and the only roughness I saw were a few sly kicks aimed at him by Missy the month-old calf.

A bunch of dedicated Brisbane Arts Theatre members ran the tasty sausage sizzle. There are some great productions on at the theatre at moment: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, as well as Pinocchio for children. Coming up in June is the hugely popular comedy musical Avenue Q. The BAT gets no government or corporate support, so when you buy a ticket and see a show there, you truly are supporting a community organisation that gives creative people space to perform and develop skills.

RSPCA Qld has been great to me during this whole adventure; and again, I would urge anyone looking to get a pet to consider adoption. Thanks to their community outreach volunteers for sharing their time - and their puppies! - with us.

Greg and Dan - aka science podcasters from Smart Enough to Know Better - came up early with me to help set up, and along with the delightful Simm and Sarah, did the bulk of the collections work. A number of others took turns holding the fort so others could play/leave. Thanks to you all.

Kate Rohde rose to my challenge to bake cupcakes for the event admirably. Kate's developing her own small boutique cake business, and her delicious wares quickly sold out. Congratulations, Kate.

Thanks must go to my electrician, who's been waiting on the $700 I owe him for installing new lights for a few weeks now. Turns out I found another use for it; and I didn't feel too bad because you know you messed me around a bit (that's a whole other post right there). The good news is, I recouped the cash! So you'll get your pound of flesh next week, freshly laundered through the goodwill of punters and goodwool of animals.

Most importantly, I'd like to thank EVERYONE who took some time out and came along, and who were so brilliant in spreading the word. Your enthusiasm and kindness means a whimsically foolish idea I had turned out to bring more smiles to my face than I could have imagined; and even better, a bit of extra dosh for animal welfare groups, a very good cause indeed. 

Finally, it would be remiss of me to not credit that person who mistakenly sent me that email with quotes for a baby animal farm. That one action set in motion a chain of somewhat fantastical decisions that resulted in today's amazing experience. Most unwanted emails are spam... this one actually proved to be real ham.

The Infestation

I don't know when it began, but it feels like it's been going on for months, like the Republican primaries or the reality TV shows about weight loss.

The Infestation.

Google tells me they are Indian Meal Moths, and they are damn hard to be rid of.

I've had them before in my pantry, but never as bad as they seem to be at the moment. They're in everything, these tiny winged terrors. Worst of all, they tend to like foods they actually physically resemble, like oats and rice and motherf***ing sunflower seeds:

Is this part of my breakfast? Or part of a nightmarish scenario where I eat moths and moths grow in
my stomach and have baby moths and eventually turn me inside out into a foul demonic humano-moth?

I think the meal moths have overtaken geckos as my new freak-out-creating creature of choice.

Playing the Goat

I didn't get a chance to upload this last week, after popping in and out of the Ekka a few times for work purposes. The petting zoo is always my favourite.

Back in the Saddle

Last week I went for a horseride.

Two hours in the Kurwongbah bush atop a mighty bay mare named Diva.

Clumsy Vs Marsupials

A test of patience and animal husbandry at Adelaide Zoo.

Possum

After Sunday night's Fists of Fury show, I grabbed my camera to film a lovely wee possum, who was busy rifling through the bins looking for tasty morsels. We often find the courtyard bins knocked over; the local possums are very used to humans (even theatre types) and quite aggressive when it comes to finding dinner.

My recent iLife software update included a new "trailer" function in iMovie, so I played about with it for about ten minutes and created the following work of cinematic genius:

Come to the final Fists of Fury show this Sunday 5 December, and you might see our cheeky possum for yourself.

Giant Moth

A gigantic, ungodly moth creature paid a late night visit to Chez Clumsy. We made it do showtunes as punishment. Punishment!

#30before30: Visit an Abattoir

The state government’s “Walk A Day” campaign is certainly making for interesting times for journalists sent out to cover politicians. Last Friday I watched Education Minister Geoff Wilson pull beers at the Arana Leagues Club, and on Monday morning I saw Natural Resources Minister Stephen Robertson knocking around the Underwood Bunnings in a tool belt.

But it was Monday afternoon’s visit to the Churchill Abattoir at Yamanto that really took the cake. Although perhaps “cake” isn’t the right word.

Girl Versus Dog

Greetings from Hong Kong! I can report the weather is fine yet hazy, with humidity so close you could grab its collars and give it a good slap in the face. If you're inclined to do those sorts of things, of course. Me? I'm not too bad with humidity. Apparently this makes me some sort of freak. Tell you what though - I'd rather be sweating than suffering through that horrid fluid-sucking feeling of a dry heat. Even if I did skull a 500ml Coke Light in about 13 seconds last night.

But I digress.

I wanted to spend some time this morning wandering the forested trails near Parkview, the sprawling apartment complex that houses the Hong Kong wing of the extended Clumsy clan. I thought it might be nice to take Dusky, their dog, a rather excitable labrador cross, with me.

Dusky, however, had other ideas. Obstinate, doggy ideas:

I guess it was over 30 degrees outside, and approaching midday. Maybe Dusky's the smart one.

Best Ekka Pun

On a cool but only slightly breezy evening, with crowds on the wane, and in the company of the The Wah, my brother and his girlfriend, the Ekka was actually very palatable. The Wah proved how well thousands of hours of first-person shooters can serve you, winning us two small stuffed toy dogs at "Honest Glen's" shooting duck emporium. My brother shouted us to strawberry sundaes. We watched the fireworks. We bought Bertie Beetle showbags. And we did my favourite thing - visiting the farm animal petting zoo.

Licked

Sometimes covering Queensland parliament is just too much fun.

This little guy was one of four brought to the Speaker's Green this afternoon. Corrective Services Minister Neil Roberts was announcing the expansion of the "Pups in Prisons" program to the Borallon jail. Four Labs - including Bruiser here - will be given to specially chosen inmates for 18 months of training and socialisation. They'll then leave to undergo more intensive training to become Assistance Dogs.

They've already had eight dogs go through the program at the Darling Downs Correctional Centre; so it's a good news story all round. I was the only journo who turned up, so I had a chat to the Minister, then I got to play with the puppies - this one seemed to find something tasty about my face, before turning his attention to chomping on my earring.

I was trying to sneak him away with me so finally I could live out my childhood dream of being a crime-fightin' reporter with a canine best friend, but sadly I had to give him back.

Feel free to make all the dog/journalist/politician jokes you like, though.

Remember, the competition to win a rug (worth $75!) is still running until Friday night! Please enter!

Lashings of Cream Cakes

This evening saw the first ImproMafia Sunday night show at the Brisbane Arts Theatre - Enid Blyton: By the Book.

I played beloved English children's author Enid Blyton, and used suggestions from the boys and girls in the audience to inspire a new adventure story.

The "hook" of the show was Oscar the border collie - that's right, we put a live dog onstage, Famous Five-style.

Oscar belongs to my friends Alisha and Mark, who very kindly lent him to us for training, rehearsals and the show. The Wah and I have known Oscar since he was a puppy - he's so happy and friendly. It really was a case of the dog inspiring the show.

Thankfully, the audience responded just as I'd hoped: they loved it if Oscar did things "right", but laughed even more if he did things "wrong", such as wander away, leave the stage, or refuse to follow directions. They particularly seemed to enjoy Oscar's single-minded determination to grab every piece of kabana he possibly could - kabana being our "training tool".

Angkor Elephants

When you get to some "must see" destinations in the world, you sometimes feel they've been over-rated.

The Temples of Angkor - in particular, the marvellous Angkor Wat - are NOT one of those places.

I'll post some pictures of our nine-hour day at the temples this morning soon, but first, I must show you - feeding bananas to elephants!

Tasting Tarantula

What do you do at a petrol stop at Skon, about 75 kilometres north of Phnom Penh? Try some crispy fried tarantula, that's what.

The Sting

It was actually The Wah who got hit first.

"Argh!" he cried, throwing his arm up out of the warm waters of Ha Long Bay. "I've been stung, something's stung me on the arm!"

"Deep breaths, and we'll swim back to the boat quickly," I yelled back.

Then, bam! Lashings of fire raced up my left arm.

"It's got me too...argh!"

I raised my arm above the waterline, but could see no stingers or tentacles on me. The pain wasn't too bad then; just a strong burning feeling. I looked ahead.

The boat - the Bien Ngoc 08 - was still about 20 metres from where we where, treading water and trying to see into the thick green around us for anymore signs of the little bastard/s that had got us. But directly in front of us was a young woman, on her small flat wooden boat, with a traditional conical hat shielding her face from the late afternoon sun, and her oar outstretched.

"Jellyfish!" she cried, slapping the oar down onto the water next to her.

The Wah and I tried to move in the other direction. "Jellyfish!" she cried again, pointing, this time to water on the other side of the boat.

"Which way?" we yelled. "Are you pointing TO the jellyfish, or AWAY from the jellyfish?"

The young woman had been circling the boat for a while, her craft laden with Oreos, Aquafina water bottles, Choco-Pie biscuits, and alcohol. Water-born touts, trying to make a living from hungry western tourists. "You buy something?" and "Ice-cold beer, vodka, whisky!" had seemed to be the limit of her English-speaking ability.

That, and of course, "Jellyfish!" She slapped the oar down onto the water again.

We'd passed her by a few minutes earlier, after deciding we wanted to swim out about 200 metres and touch the base of one of the huge limestone mountains that make up the World Heritage listed Ha Long Bay. We'd turned down her requests to buy something. But now, two jellyfish stings later, she was going to be of service, whether she liked it or not.

"We're just going to have to push," said The Wah. "We'll just push her boat towards ours, and stay at the back. Hopefully the jellyfish will keep off to the sides."

We grabbed the wooden stern, arms still aching, and started kicking. After a while, the confused young woman realised what we were doing, and starting paddling her oar. A few minutes passed, punctuated by the occasional "Jellyfish!".

By this time, everyone else on board the Bien Ngoc 08 was watching. They'd all climbed out of the water while we were over at the rock, having been warned of jellyfish coming out in the pre-dusk. But we'd been too far away by then; and they didn't want to panic us. After seeing us both get stung so close to home, they were ready at the ladder to help us onboard, once we'd kicked the young woman's boat far enough.

"I'll come back, I'll buy water," I told the young woman. She scrounged about in her battered esky and fished out a few pieces of ice, which a fellow traveller took and began applying to my arm. The Wah and I climbed the stairs to the ship's main deck, where other passengers had grabbed several lemons from the crew.

"Vinegar! We need vinegar!" said The Wah.

But they didn't have vinegar - only lemons. We squeezed about half a dozen of them onto our arms - the Wah had also receiving a whip across the lower chest. Both had turned red-and-white, the skin raised with angry heat. The Wah, being more stoic than I, took the pain more manfully.

Mindful of my relatively fresh travelling companions, I decided against completely losing my shit, despite the pain that seemed to grow and come in waves of white heat. Some kind of shock set in, and I sat down, my stomach knotted, my back tense with pressure, opening and closing my hands to make sure they didn't clench themselves into paralysis.

It took over an hour for the pain to subside enough, and the shock to wear off enough, to brave a shower. I managed to climb onto the boat's roof just in time to see the beautiful pink-and-orange sunset over the limestone. With a deep breath, I blessed my good fortune in not being more greatly injured.

And with a second breath - I cursed all jellyfish kind.

Terrorist Chickens

"Watch out!" squealed my ten-year-old cousin, Amber. "They're terrorist chickens!"

I was plonked on the asphalt driveway of my aunt's home, trying to snap some pictures of her "pet" chickens.

"They are!" Amber enthused, as my other cousin Alex fluttered about herding the browny-orange birds in the direction of my lens. "This wild rooster got in, and got them excited, and bit me on the bum!" she said. "I kicked it away, but it came back, and bit me again!"

"You got bitten on the bum by a Wild Rooster Terrorist Chicken - twice?"

"Yes!" she nodded. "So what makes these chickens terrorist chickens, then?" I asked.

"Oh, they're all the same!" was the reply, as she scrambled for safety into the passenger side of her parents' car and slammed the door behind her.

I don't know. I thought the chickens were reasonably charming. But maybe Amber's got a point. Sometimes, those chickens, when they look at you...

The Best Laid Plans

The best-laid schemes o'mice an 'men,
Gang aft agley,
An'lea'e us nought but grief an' pain
For promis'd joy!
-Robbie Burns, To A Mouse (1785)

I offer up the words of the Scottish poet as a tribute to The Clan Squeaky. Of course Burns himself would probably prefer I offered you a celebratory dram instead (with a triple for himself, the great Hebridean lush), but nonetheless, the mournful Scots language will have to suffice for a eulogy.

That's right. The Clan Squeaky was a valiant enemy. But it has been all but vanquished.

The false sense of security we fell into after the capture of the fearsome matriarch Ms Squeaky in the pre-dawn hours of Thursday was broken less than 24 hours later, when her offspring decided to show their tiny baby mousey faces again. God knows where they had been in the interim since fleeing their toilet paper nest; somehow I think I may be better not knowing.

The Wah found the first one hiding under the fridge, after hearing suspicious rustling sounds. I then spotted the second dashing under the TV cabinet; and the third then turned up in the Bat Cave. Unlike their now-missing mother, they were not afraid of us. The Wah came close to picking up the third mouse by the tail before it zipped away. Being younger, they also seemed slower, which we believe aided in our eventual success in their capture.

I wish I'd had a video camera rolling on the series of slapstick physical encounters we had with the mice around half past one this morning. I've never seen so much silliness with shoeboxes. I managed the first capture; launching the large box lid from my recent boot purchase at Mousey One as it hurried away from the couch. Like a frisbee it soared and landed neatly over the little blighter. Unfortunately it was too big to flip over onto the box effectively, and Mousey One escaped The Wah's grasp and joined its sibling under the fridge.


We established another blockade of laundry powder boxes and the Wii Fit case and readied ourselves. The Wah got his "pointy stick" (a fancy fake-flower accoutrement thingy) and poked about under the Westinghouse. Then, bang! Mousey One, panicked, fled in the only direction he could, which happily was directly into the humane mouse trap, which we'd re-set near the fridge.

We turned our attention to Mousey Two, who unfortunately was a lot more spirited than his or her sibling. The Wah managed to slam a shoebox down on him, but it sprang out of a gap as he tried to put on the lid, and dashed into a gap between the cupboard and the dishwasher. A few more pokes later, and The Wah had coaxed him back out - eventually slamming both hands down around Mousey Two for a catch that would make *insert name of famous football goalkeeper here* proud. We got him into shoebox - and thus, we had two meeces:

We headed up to the park again, and The Wah released the two mice:

And just because it's pretty, here's a photo of a very misty Gregory Terrace:

So I'm sorry Ms Squeaky. You laid plans to have a family in my house - plans that I have foiled. Well, technically The Wah was the grand plan-foiler, but that's beside the point. Life isn't fair, and I'm sure I'll have more than my fair share of plans "gang agley" too. But for now, I'm notching up a victory for me. Well, technically a victory for The Wah, but that's beside the point.

Of course, one member of the Clan Squeaky remains. I caution the tim'rous wee beastie to surrender now...